528

MARCHING ON MANASSAS.

two miles and a half in the night to reach a point less thanhalf a mile from where I had started. We passedthrough the gap and camped that night on the groundthat Ricketts’s troops had held in the afternoon. Thesecond battle of Bull Run was practically decided atThoroughfare Gap. Had McDowell’s whole corps beenassigned to the duty of keeping Longstreet on the westside of the Bull Run Mountains, it could, properlyhandled, have kept him there long enough to enableGeneral Pope to crush Jackson with the other forces athis disposal.

“ At sunrise the next morning we were on the marchtoward Manassas , Hood’s division leading. A shortdelay was caused near Gainesville by the passage of aportion of Stuart’s cavalry from left to right across ourline of march; but before 10 o’clock the head of thecolumn reached Jackson’s battle-held, where heavy artil-lery bring was then going on. There have been manydifferent statements as to the time of Longstreet’s ar-rival at Manassas on the 29th of xAugust. I am absolutelycertain that Hood’s division reached there not later thanthe time above stated. The distance to our camp of theprevious night was under eight miles, and we marchedsteadily from 6 o’clock until we reached the held,with the exception of less than an hour’s halt caused bythe passage of the cavalry already referred to. At thattime, in'addition to the artillery firing, heavy skirmish-ing was in progress along Jackson’s line, which wasformed on the grading of an unfinished railroad runningfrom Sudley Ford to a point near the Warrenton turnpikein rear (north-west) of Groveton. The line formed anacute angle with the pike, and the right wing wasthrown back so as partially to face that road. Federaltroops were moving on and to the south of the pike,around Jackson’s right, when we arrived. Our divisionwas thrown quickly into line across the road, one bri-gade on each side, and pressed these troops steadilyback until Jackson’s flank was cleared, when we tookup a line on the ridge west of Groveton, slightly in ad-vance of Jackson’s right.

“The other troops of Longstreet’s command were nowrapidly coming up. Kemper, with three brigades, tookposition to the right of Hood, andD. R. Jones’s divisionstill farther to the right, extending the line a mile anda half south of the turnpike. Evans’s brigade came upin rear of Hood, and Wilcox’s three brigades wereposted in rear of the interval between Longstreet’s left

and Jackson’s right, the interval itself being occupiedby Colonel Walton’s battalion of Washington Artillery.”

Colonel John S. Mosby , C. S. A., said, in 1887,in his lecture on “ War Reminiscences ” :

“ The reason that Jackson left Manassas was thatStuart had captured a dispatch showing that Pope wasconcentrating his army on that point. General Jack-son says: ‘ General Stuart kept me advised of themovements of the enemy.’ In a dispatch to Fitz JohnPorter, on the evening of the 27th, Pope ordered him tobe at Bristoe at daylight the next morning to bag Jack-son, who was then five miles off'. General Pope saysthat Jackson made a mistake in leaving Manassas beforehe got there. If Jackson went there to be caught, itwas. If Pope had reached the place at daylight hewould have found nothing but a rear-guard of Stuart’scavalry. He has censured Porter for not getting therein time to bag Jackson. Pope himself arrived aboutnoon. It happened that the evening before I rode offto a farmer’s house to get some supper and slept undera tree in the yard. The next morning I returned to theJunction thinking our army was still there. I foundthe place deserted and as silent as the cities of the plain.So, if General Pope and Fitz John Porter had come atthat time they might have caught me, that is, if theirhorses were faster than mine. . . . On the evening ofthe 28th, Longstreet drove Ricketts’s division fromThoroughfare, and the head of his column bivouackedwithin about six miles of Jackson. During the fight Irode with Stuart toward Thoroughfare Gap. As Rickettswas then between him and Longstreet, Stuart sent adispatch by a trusty messenger urging him [Longstreet]to press on to the support of Jackson.”

And in a letter to the editors, referring to theabove, Colonel Mosby says :

“You will also see that I make some new points inFitz John Porter’s case. I was a witness against himand was somewhat prejudiced against him by the un-wise attacks his friends made on Stuart, and by being aparticular friend of Colonel [T. C. H.] Smith, who pre-ferred charges against Porter . You may remember thatGeneral Pope in his ‘Century’ article quotes Stuart’sreport to convict Porter : both sides have misunderstoodit. Stuart is a conclusive witness for Porter . I tooknothing in my lecture second-hand.”

MARCHING ON MANASSAS.

BY W. ROY MASON, MAJOR, C. S. A.

O N the 23d of August, as our brigade (Field’s,of Hill’s division) was passing through an oakforest several miles from our starting-point in themorning, General Field and his staff riding leis-urely at its head, we were hailed by General Fitz-hugh Lee , who, with his staff, had alighted on oneside of the road. He requested us to dismount, ashe had something to show us. He then slippedbehind a big oak-tree, and, in a moment or two,emerged dressed in the long blue cloak of aFederal general that reached nearly down to hisfeet, and wearing a Federal general’s hat with itsbig plume. This masquerade was accompanied bya burst of jolly laughter from him that might havebeen heard for a hundred yards. We inquired asto what this meant, and he told us that the nightbefore he had made a raid upon Pope ’s head-quarters, near Catlett’s Station, with orders tocapture him. He had surrounded his tent, but

& General Stuart reports that Fitzhugh Lee ’s com-mand “charged the camp, capturing a large number ofprisoners, particularly officers, and securing public prop-

upon going in had found only the supper-tablespread there, and near it a quartermaster [MajorCharles N. Goulding] and one or two minor staff-officers, whom he took greatly by surprise.

Pope’s cloak and hat were in the tent, and hewas told that the general had taken them off onaccount of the heat, and had walked down throughthe woods to visit the headquarters of some othergeneral,—where, they did iiot know. Being pressedfor time, and anxious to retreat from a positionthat might soon become a dilemma, General FitzLee requested the quartermaster to open the mili-tary chest of his chief, 'which was found to contain(to the best of my recollection) $350,000 in green-backs, after which, mounting the Federal officersbehind three of his men, he prepared to go.^ Hedid not forget to take the supper from the table,however, or the uniform coat and hat from thechair.

erty to a fabulous amount.” Pope’s uniform, bis horsesand equipments and money-chests were included in theenumeration of captures.— Editors.